US President Donald Trump has warned the Syrian government and its Russian and Iranian allies against “recklessly” attacking rebel-held Idlib province.
In a tweet, he warned of “a grave humanitarian mistake” in which hundreds of thousands of people could be killed.
Syrian government forces are said to be preparing a huge offensive on the last major rebel stronghold in the country.
The UN says such a campaign could have disastrous consequences for thousands of civilians.
The US State Department also warned on Monday that Washington would respond to any chemical attacks by the Syrian government or its allies.
US ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley tweeted: “All eyes on the actions of Assad, Russia, and Iran in Idlib. #NoChemicalWeapons.”
With rebels defeated in most of Syria, the offensive in the northern province could prove to be the last major battle of the Syrian civil war.
According to a UN estimate, there are about 10,000 al-Nusra and al-Qaeda jihadist fighters still holding out in Idlib.
Sources quoted by Reuters news agency said that President Bashar al-Assad was preparing a phased offensive.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said “terrorists” must be wiped out in Idlib, accusing them of using civilians as human shields.
Both he and his Syrian counterpart, Walid Muallem, have accused rebels of preparing to stage a chemical attack in Idlib in order to blame pro-government forces and draw new US military retaliation.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said that recent naval drills off Syria were justified, adding that the “hotbed of terrorists” in Idlib must be tackled.
UN envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura has warned of a “perfect storm” if the government goes ahead with its threatened offensive in Idlib.
He called for humanitarian corridors to be set up to allow civilians to be evacuated temporarily.
The jihadists must be defeated, Mr. de Mistura said, but not at the expense of thousands of civilian lives.
“There is a perfect storm based on warnings, counter-warnings which is gathering around and due to the dilemma, which is a true dilemma on how to defeat terrorists in Idlib and at the same time avoid affecting a huge number of civilians,” he said.
“So, while we are aware that efforts and discussions are taking place to avoid the worst-case scenario, one cannot ignore that miscalculations may indeed occur leading to unforeseen escalation and we are all very much concerned.”
The UN is desperate to avoid the deaths of civilians seen recently in other parts of Syria such as Aleppo, Raqqa or the Eastern Ghouta, and its diplomats are appealing for all sides to show restraint.
Mr. de Mistura offered to go to Idlib personally to set up a humanitarian corridor which, he acknowledged, would mean evacuating people into government-controlled territory.
After more than seven years of fighting, more than 400,000 people are dead or missing, and more than half the population have been driven out of their homes.
Idlib has been a haven for rebels and their families evacuated out of areas won back by the government, but there is no obvious place for them to move to within Syria if they abandon the province now.
Any offensive on Idlib could raise tension with Turkey, which maintains observation posts around rebel territory as part of a “de-escalation deal” with Russia and Iran.
Iran is to host a summit on Friday at which the leaders of Iran, Russia and Turkey will discuss Idlib, Fars news agency reported.
Trump Supreme Court nominee Kanavaugh faces key hearing
President Donald Trump’s nominee for the vacant Supreme Court seat is set to face the first of four days of Senate hearings on Tuesday.
Brett Kavanaugh, a Catholic, would tilt the court’s balance to the right if approved by the Senate.
Many democrats strongly oppose Mr. Trump’s choice as they fear a more socially conservative approach to abortion and gay rights.
Mr. Kavanaugh, 53, will be grilled by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The senators will also hear from witnesses for and against the nominee.
The nine-justice court has until now been balanced between conservatives and liberals, with Anthony Kennedy considered the “swing vote.”
He retired in July.
Mr. Kavanaugh is a conservative and democrats say he could erode abortion rights, which are enshrined in the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling.
He is opposed to gay rights and is pro-gun.
They are also concerned about his belief that a sitting president should be immuned from prosecution.
The Supreme Court might have to rule on the issue should Special Counsel Robert Mueller decide that Mr. Trump may have violated campaign finance laws.
The campaign finance issue emerged as part of Mr. Mueller’s investigation into allegations of collusion between the Trump election campaign and Russia.
The president’s lawyers have vowed to fight any subpoena request all the way to the highest court.
The Trump administration has also angered democrats by refusing to release 27,000 documents relating to Mr. Kavanaugh’s time as part of the legal team serving President George W Bush. The White House cited “constitutional privilege.”
Democrats – currently in the minority in the House and the Senate – also dislike his opposition to the Affordable Care Act – Obamacare – as a US Court of Appeals judge.
On the release of documents, Republicans say Democrats have more than enough information to make their judgement – and more than 120,000 documents were made available relating to the nominee’s time in the Bush White House.
Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell tweeted his support on Friday.
He faces up to three days of questioning from the Senate Judiciary Committee, including the senior Democrat Diane Feinstein.
More than 20 witnesses are being called.
“There will be sparks at this hearing,” Senator Richard Blumenthal, also a Democrat, has predicted.
Assuming he clears that hurdle, it will be up to the full Senate to decide.
Republicans have a slim majority in the 100-seat upper house, and most have declared they will back him.
Not all Democrats have said they will oppose him and it is thought some could even support Mr. Kavanaugh’s nomination.
A resident of the wealthy Washington suburb of Chevy Chase, Mr. Kavanaugh studied law at Yale.
He worked under special counsel Kenneth Starr in his investigation into President Bill Clinton’s relationship with intern Monica Lewinsky in the 1990s.
Under George W Bush, he served as deputy White House counsel and, from 2003 to 2006, as Bush’s staff secretary.
Mr. Kavanaugh is likely to have been involved in a range of issues, including the so-called war on terrorism and discussions about how to deal with enemy combatants.
He has been a US Court of Appeals judge in Washington for the past 11 years.
Jalaluddin Haqqani, founder of Afghan militant network, dies
The founder of the Haqqani militant network has died after several years of illness, the Afghan Taliban has announced.
Jalaluddin Haqqani was a significant militant figure in Afghanistan and had close ties to both the Taliban and al-Qaeda.
The Haqqani network has been behind many of the co-ordinated attacks on Afghan and Nato forces in recent years.
His son is believed to have taken over control of the group in 2001.
There were no details in the statement about the date nor the place of Haqqani’s death.
“Just as he endured great hardships for the religion of Allah during his youth and health, he also endured long illness during his later years,” a statement from the Afghan Taliban said.
Rumours about Haqqani’s death have circulated for years.
In 2015, sources close to the group told the BBC that the leader had died at least a year before.
This was never confirmed.
Jalaluddin Haqqani was an Afghan guerrilla leader who fought Soviet troops that occupied Afghanistan in 1980s.
US officials have admitted that at the time he was a prized asset of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
However, he later allied himself to the Taliban after they took power in Afghanistan in 1996.
In its statement, the Taliban called Jalaluddin an “exemplary warrior… and among the great distinguished Jihadi personalities of this era.”
The Haqqani network was one of several militant groups that operated from the tribal areas along the Afghan-Pakistan border following the US-led military campaign in Afghanistan, which began in 2001.
The group, which largely operates from Pakistan, has also been blamed for some of the deadliest attacks in Afghanistan, including a truck bomb explosion in Kabul in 2017 that killed more than 150 people.
Dutch asylum row: Armenian children face expulsion
Two Armenian children who have spent most of their lives in the Netherlands face imminent deportation after emerging from hiding following a failed asylum plea.
Howick, 13, and his sister Lily, 12, came to the Netherlands with their mother in 2008.
Their mother was deported last year and the children’s friends have rallied around them, calling for them to stay.
However, the Dutch government insists its asylum policy is fair.
Prime Minister Mark Rutte said last week he understood the emotion surrounding the case but asylum numbers had to be kept under control.
“Anyone who doesn’t fall under the criteria cannot stay here,” he said.
Their mother, 37-year-old Armina Hambartsjumian, applied for asylum shortly after arriving in the Netherlands in 2008 from Russia.
The children have never lived in Armenia and barely speak the language.
When their mother was deported in 2017, she sent the children to a secret address before they were found by authorities. They have since been living with a family who had befriended their mother.
For months, the courts considered the children’s case, with campaigners arguing their mother was mentally and physically incapable of looking after them and that the children would go to an orphanage.
Protests were held in support of the children by classmates from the city of Amersfoort and the case has become a cause celebre across the Netherlands.
After a series of asylum rulings, a final decision was made last month that there were no grounds for Lily and Howick to stay.
Armenia was a safe country and there was no risk of persecution, the Council of State concluded.
The children would not end up on the street, it decided, and deportation was due to take place on September 8.
In a recent letter to Dutch newspaper, Algemeen Dagblad, the children’s mother said they were “in hiding” and in a “safe place.”
“The stress is so high that I’m scared my children will break down if this goes ahead,” she wrote, adding that she had been told by professionals that they were suffering from post traumatic stress disorder.
But on Monday, the newspaper reported that the children had emerged from three days of hiding and reported to authorities.
The Dutch immigration service told the newspaper that it would not go into individual cases.
Appearing on a talk show on Dutch TV on Saturday, the children said they had been really shocked by news of their imminent deportation.
“We belong here. They say you’re going back to Armenia but where am I going back to?” said Lily.
“If we do end up there, we’ll go into some sort of orphanage meant for a maximum of 20 children, but which already houses 30,” Howick added.
Several European countries have struggled with the deportation of children whose asylum cases have been rejected.
Campaign group Defence for Children said they were still hoping that the Dutch migration secretary would overrule the court decision.
They say there are 400 cases of children seeking asylum who have lived in the Netherlands for more than five years without a residence permit.
There were protests in the Dutch town of Culemborg last month when a Ukrainian family, whose three children were born in the Netherlands, were deported after living there for 17 years.
The Dutch immigration service turned down just over half of the 16,785 asylum applications made in 2017.
The largest number of rejections was from citizens of Morocco and Algeria.
While tens of thousands of unaccompanied minors entered Germany in 2015 and 2016, almost 90% of asylum claims were successful.
Chemnitz protests: Thousands attend free anti-racism concert
Around 65,000 people have attended a free concert against racism in the eastern German city of Chemnitz.
The town has seen far-right rallies and counter-demonstrations after two migrants were identified as suspects in the fatal stabbing of a 35-year-old German man late last month.
Punk and hip hop bands performed on Monday evening under the slogan “there are more of us,” in response to the far-right slogan “we are the people.”
Many people chanted “Nazis out.”
Organisers had to change the venue to accommodate all those who wanted to attend.
Earlier on Monday a migrant, believed to be Afghan, was sentenced to more than eight years for killing his German ex-girlfriend.
The case sparked national outrage and was seized upon by far-right groups as part of their anti-migrant campaign.
The concert began on Monday evening with a minute’s silence for the victim of the stabbing attack.
Soon after, a singer from the group Kraftklub addressed the crowd.
“We’re not naive. We’re not under the illusion that you hold a concert and then the world is saved,” he said. “But sometimes it’s important to show that you’re not alone.”
At the same time the concert was taking place, local police announced that they had arrested a man suspected of attacking a journalist during far-right demonstrations on Saturday.
But the concert was not without its opponents.
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier was criticised by some conservatives for posting the event to his Facebook page, as one of the bands performing had previously been prosecuted for advocating far-left violence.